Leland stiffened. “You’ve done this before?”
“Once.” I didn’t realize the first time it happened, but now I understood. The disembodied feeling I’d gotten when Jaxan told me Leland was at the brothel. That was this. I’d briefly bled into the ether. “Last night, Jaxan told me where you were.” I winced, remembering the unbearable heat and the urge to scream myself to mist. “I was home alone when it happened. No one saw.”
A saddened look passed through his eyes. He was unnaturally still, and his chest was visibly tight. I thought he was going to explain where he was last night, or tell me it wasn’t true, that hewasn’tat a brothel. But by the time he dipped his head to study my form, whatever I’d glimpsed in his eyes was gone.
“I wish I had been there,” he said. His words rang true, but it also sounded like he regretted saying them. “I would have helped you deal with him.”
I shook my head dismissively. “It’s fine.” I glanced at my stomach, realizing I’d lost some of my color and was blinking like I was going to burn out again. “It wasn’t this bad.”
To escape the warmth erupting behind my rib cage at the knowledge of how closely he was paying attention to me, I stared at the wall sconces. The flames seemed to rise higher and dance with a new vigor. And just to feel like I hadsomepower, I imagined it was my stare making them dance, thatIwas controlling them.
“Is it?” asked Leland. “Is it reallyfine?” He’d taken a breath before the word “fine” like he didn’t believe me.
I shrugged at him and shifted on the couch. “Are you asking because that sounded like a lie? Or are you in training to be my therapist?”
“Neither.” His eyebrows lowered in a puzzled expression. “I’m the last person who should be counseling you, and nothing you’ve ever said has sounded like a lie.”
“Yeah, well, that’s because I always tell the truth. I haven’t lied in eight months. I thought about it, once, when I was trying to figure out if you were my Counterpart, but I couldn’t make myself do it.”
“Will you?”
“Will I what?”
“Lie to me.”
“No.” I shook my head. I started to pull my hand away, too, but then I remembered I needed to hold on to him in order to come back from the ether. “What’s the point? Aren’t our gifts supposed to cancel out?”
“They are, but we don’t know how yet. It could mean you can’t lie to me. Or it could mean youcan, and I can’t detect when you do.”
In the low light of the alley, he looked deeply tan, and his eyes blazed with even more magnetism than usual. My heartrate accelerated, probably because I was remembering my last lie, going to a “friend’s house,” then turning around and falling asleep at Gray’s.
“I don’t lie,” I said with a lump in my throat.
“One lie, then we’ll be even.”
“I would have to tellmultiplelies for us to be even.”
Leland’s mouth quirked in amusement that he quickly pressed his lips together to hide. I narrowed my eyes at him. I didn’t want to do it, but if his gift neutralized mine, then at least no one’s fate would change.
“I . . .” If he was going to make me lie, I was going to make him wait for it. “Lovedseeing you with Vyra today.”
I gasped as a shock zapped me between the ribs, causing me to reflexively clutch my upper abdomen, where I pressed my hand into the cavity where the electric jolt had hit. It must have been the same sensation Leland had said “didn’t feel good,” the one he got whenever I heardhimlying.
“You did?” he egged on.
“Mm. Couldn’t be happier about it.” I coughed at the strange feeling in my chest, all the while giving him a scrutinizing look, because out of all the times he’d lied to me, not once had he shown any signs of having a physical reaction to it. It would be like getting stung by a bee and not flinching. As I patted my chest, I asked, “Is there a trick? Something you do that makes you feel the zap less?”
“If you want my honest answer” — he stared deep into my eyes — “yes.” His gaze dropped to my arm curled around my abs. “Put your hand back on mine when you’re ready.”
I let my hand fall on his, which was still resting on his leg, thinking this had something to do with the trick he’d mentioned. But by the time I realized it didn’t, Leland had changed the subject before I could bring it up again.
“You can’t lie to me,” he stated, “which means we still don’tknow how your gift neutralizes mine.”
“I can hear when you lie,” I offered.
“Yeah, but it doesn’t stop me from truth-telling. It’s more like a” — he laughed, not happily — “like the Goddess is pushing us to trust each other.”
“Is that how the bond seals?”
